Important but challenging meditations, applying Jesus to everyday life.

Thursday, February 26, 2015

Is Suffering Beneficial?

As a new pastor (many years ago now), I welcomed my church
to a Sunday evening bible study. Only a
few people showed up at first, but we had the occasional visitor. A tall, red-haired man and his wife showed
up, and sat down listening while slightly uncomfortable. The subject that night was the New Testament
teaching on suffering, and how suffering is seen as beneficial, for it develops
character.

We read Romans 5, “Tribulation
brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven
character, hope.” (Rom 5:3-4). And
Paul in Acts, “Through many tribulations
we must enter the kingdom of God." (Acts 14:22) And James, “Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials,
knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance
have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in
nothing.” (James 1:2-4)

The red-haired man finally spoke: “That is a load of
crap. I have suffered pain for the last
five years, a degenerative condition in my back and neck that leaves me
immobile for days. I function as well as
I can, but often I can’t do anything.
And I’m here to tell you, my pain and ‘tribulation’ hasn’t improved my
character one bit. In my suffering I am
only more irritable, irrational, frustrated and hateful. My wife hates who I’ve become and no one
visits me because I’ve become a miserable wretch. So don’t give me some fairy tale about
suffering developing character. That’s
naïve bullshit.”

It seems that I gave him some platitudes and unsatisfying
dogmatics that night, but I don’t really remember much about my response. I’ve never forgotten his honest evaluation of
the text, however. It’s easy for a young
person who hasn’t undergone chronic suffering to quote and evaluate texts in
the Bible and to express an opinion, but until one has actually suffered our
opinion doesn’t count for much. We
should listen to Paul, Jesus, James and others in the NT because they knew what
they were talking about. They understood
suffering, and knew the consequence. But
they gave us little more than summaries of their experience. Not enough for a person unexperienced with
trauma to comfort anyone.

Since my experience with the red-haired man, I have had a
number of encounters with suffering.
I’ve suffered chronic, deep pain with gallstones and an inflamed
appendix. I’ve had sciatica which shot
pain through my leg for weeks at a time.
I’ve experienced a decade of depression.
I’ve been rejected by my friends and co-workers, accused of all kinds of
immoral and criminal activity. I’ve had
the police, the homeless and the mentally ill scream threats at my face. I’ve encountered the deaths of too many of my
friends and seen my wife suffer because of a lifestyle that has been hard on
both of us. I don’t say this in order to
obtain sympathy, but to establish my qualifications: After the last two decades, I have gained the
right to draw some conclusions about suffering that I was unable to say as a
young pastor.

1.Suffering benefits no one if it disregards our responsibility

Often when we suffer, we are looking for
the cause of our anguish. That makes
sense, because if we find the cause of pain, then we can often resolve it. All too often, however, we think that the
cause of our anguish is the final trigger of us snapping, rather than the
chronic precursors. It is easy to blame
my child’s noise for my anger, instead of my overwork or the constant pain in
my back. I blame my child, not because
she is the real cause of my suffering, but because she will accept my blame and
agree with my evaluation. If I blame
causes that have no real solution, or no easy solution, then I cannot give
myself the temporary satisfaction of having “solved” the problem. Suffering can allow us to misjudge the source
of our suffering because we find the true source to be difficult to find. This is self-deception, and perpetuates our
mental anguish.

2.

Suffering benefits no one if it excuses our
tendency to cause others to suffer

When we suffer, our natural response is to
pass that suffering on to others. We
don’t mean to cause others to suffer, we simply want to reduce our own
suffering by controlling others’ actions.
In our mental anguish, the only way we find to control others is by increasing
their suffering. As if our suffering
excuses our causing suffering in others.
What we don’t understand is that if we increase others’ suffering, then
those around us will be miserable, isolated, and respond to us with increasing
our suffering in turn. This cycle of
suffering producing suffering comes back against us, and we end lonely, bitter,
and angry. This end result of this cycle
is that we become a small, shriveled, black mass of hate.

3.Suffering is a benefit if it teaches us to
lessen ourselves

The first lesson we must learn from our
anguish is that we are weak. We are not
failures, we are not corrupt, but we are weak and we can accomplish nothing in
and of ourselves. We need to stop
thinking that we are the power in our world, that we do our work of our own
power or ability. Suffering teaches us
humility. It teaches us the need for
rest, because we are unable to function without a Sabbath. It teaches us the need for community, because
we are unable to function without others to support and take our place when our
suffering is too great. It teaches us to
depend on God, for only God never fails, is always strong.

4.Suffering is beneficial if through it we
accomplish God’s will

An acquaintance of mine has suffered with
fibro myalgia for years. For those who
do not know, FM is daily pain, some days worse than others, where the cause is
unknown and it is incurable. She is also the mother of two, one of whom is
autistic. These children are her life,
and she has the most remarkable parental wisdom I have ever heard. She is not a perfect parent, but she is an
amazing person because of her focus on her children. For a person in great pain, she is full of
love and is so inventive. Her suffering
sometimes limits her because when she has a bad day, she is unable to function
at all. But she has others who help her,
her husband and a small group of friends.
She is an inspiration to many, not just because of her pain, but because
she knows what God’s will is for her life—raising her children—and she pours
her energy into that work, not allowing her ailment to stop her. This gives her a strength of character and
wisdom that without her suffering and work she might never obtain.

5.Suffering is beneficial if it drives us toward
empathy

I have seen a wrong attitude toward the poor
cripple people. Many people have a poor
view of the homeless. Some think that
the homeless are criminals, lazy, worth nothing. Many of these people become homeless
themselves. Some do not change their
opinions. Some homeless steal, and they
think that all homeless are like that; some homeless leave piles of trash and
they think they all do that. In that
way, they also hate themselves, because they see themselves as a part of this
horrible group. Others become homeless
and it opens their eyes. Suddenly, they
understand that the homeless are a compassionate, supportive group, struggling
to survive against the odds. These
homeless use their suffering to empathize, to have compassion, to understand
others’ pain and struggle. When I was in
the depths of my depression, I stumbled into a pornography addiction. This allowed me to understand the addiction
of many people that I knew, and gave me the compassion to deal with them
gently, to have the wisdom and strength to help them make better
decisions. Suffering can help our
neighbor if it increases our love.

Anawim Christian Community

About Me

I'm a pastor of the homeless and mentally ill, and as such I find I am getting more mentally ill every day. I am also a theologian/philosopher, and I am a film butt... I mean buff. Oh, and I take pictures with a cheap digital camera-- that makes me one step lower than an amateur photographer.